Favorite or go to dishes you make?

[tomf]

What are some of your favorite or go to dishes you make? If you want to share recipes with us that would be nice. One of the meals I make quite often is stir-fry. I change up the spice and ingredients to keep it interesting. I make a lot of Mexican dishes as well. As my wife needs a low salt diet I make my own spice combinations and cook with out salt. She also does the same. I also love to make Italian food, I make a verity of different dishes and a killer lasagna. I make a number of other dishes but these are my go to ones. I joined Pintrest, there are so many recipes there to try.

[pepperhead212]

I have hundreds of favorites that I have been accumulating through the years. Early on, I started a loose-leaf notebook, where I would write my favorites, which I called my "blue book", and eventually, I had to transfer all of my Asian recipes to another notebook, which I call my black book. I have put most of them on a program in my computer, but it's still easier to use a book, esp. when making several dishes.

[webmaster]

Lately I've been buying a whole chicken when it comes on sale then roasting it. Then I use it for about four meals during the week. I just add a little for Chicken Alfredo, chicken carnitas tacos, chicken puttanesca style pasta (with anchovies, capers and olives), and sometimes with gravy and mashed potatoes, chicken with Indian simmer sauce and basmati rice and an Asian stir fry. With some chickens I can make five meals out of one chicken.

A go-to meal? One hour Paella.
1 Chorizo sausage
1/3 to 1/2 pound or more of calamari tentacles (substitute baby octopus if they sell it locally!)
9 or more shrimps
Some leftover chicken if you like
Saffron
Turmeric
Soup powder

Seafood marinade
Olive oil
1 Tbsp Smoked paprika
4+ cloves of chopped garlic
Saffron threads
half a teaspoon of turmeric
Dash or three of white wine vinegar, preferably champagne vinegar or you can use the juice of one lemon or lime.

This is a Spanish dish that's basically like a Jambalaya. Traditionally they use special pans and open flames and bake it for hours and hours. But my way tastes just as good and better than many others I've tasted where they have fussed all day to make. And mine only takes about an hour to make, regardless if the rice was done ahead of time or not.

Seafood is marinated in the above marinade. Let it marinade for a few minutes or longer if you want. Doesn't really need to marinade. Once you're ready throw it into pan and sautee in the juice on a medium low heat. Doesn't take long.

While that's cooking bake your sausage until it's fully cooked through, 350 degrees for about a half hour should do it. Then put it in the food processor then sautee it a little more in a pan that's maybe 14 inches big.

Add seafood with all the juices in with chorizo.
Add one or two teaspoons of broth powder
Add about a 1/3 cup to half cup of water
Let it boil down a little so that when you throw the rice in the rice doesn't become soggy, but you still want some water in there.

Throw in the rice and mix it all around. Turn down the heat and let it simmer on low for about a half hour. Or you can throw it in the 375 degree oven with a cover on the pan for about a half hour.

You can add green peppers if you like, sautéed onions, etc. It's a very flexible recipe. Once you've made it you'll see how flexible it is so that you can improvise. The Spanish style chorizo is the key though. A little goes a long way, about a 1/3 of a pound is plenty. The chorizo is for flavor, not for filling you up.

[digitS']

Like you Tom, I go to a stir-fry often. Quite a few different meats and vegetables can play a role. A little broth, splash of soy sauce, probably some of that broth with some cornstarch stirred in. Serve over rice from the rice cooker. I'm done.

Nearly all meat goes through a marinade but mostly it's chicken. Usually, 2 parts soy sauce, 2 parts vinegar, 1 part oil. There are lots of variations with the vinegars and adding onion, garlic, ginger ...

This winter, I don't have my little beds of Asian greens in the greenhouse but we frequent the supermarket produce aisle even when I do.

Rice is always on hand. So is pasta and there's frozen pasta sauce from our tomatoes. Our potatoes and winter squash from the basement with some meat, it's easy to put "something" on the table.

DW has salt restrictions, also. I use Mrs Dash and sauces rather than salt. I figure that the addition of flavor lowers the desire for salt.

Steve

[applestar]

My goto quick to make meal often involves some kind of pasta or noodles and leftovers.

- Especially this time of the year, noodle soups are common
— packaged dry or “fresh/frozen” ramen noodles, leftover meats, veggies. I hardly ever use the instant flavor packets. Toss the meats in with root veggies in the ramen boiling water, add noddles, add leafy veggies, sometimes tomatoes and/or peppers and chopped scallions/green onion and garlic tops from my winter Indoor garden, or frozen greens from the summer garden. Frozen peas, corn, etc. I might wash eggs and boil them first in the water if I have no meats. Remove and shell, then either put back halfcooked ones whole or slice up hard boiled ones and put on top at serving. Use additional toppings like sesame seeds, torn up nori, etc.
— soba or udon noodles are cooked separate from the soup base made with konbu.kelp and bonito flakes and/or dried sardines. Add whatever veggies that might suit. Protein for these is usually some kind of soy product or seafood. Frozen shrimp or scallops maybe, surimi, age/fried tofu.... I discovered H-mart sells tasty tempura shrimp at their prepared foods counter - 6 to a wrapped styrofoam tray pack. Re-heat these separate in in the toaster oven and top the noodle soup bowls at serving. Udon is also good with leftover porkchop or chicken.

- regular pasta, too, with or without tomato-based sauce. Often leftovers are involved here as well. Usually just made up on the fly....
— e.g. last night’s pasta — whole wheat fusili cooked al dante or just before, scoop out the pasta from pot, discard most of the cooking water but reserve about 2-3 cups, put in leftover roasted sweet potatoes and winter squash (last of the acorn squash from the garden), 3Tbs butter, 1-2 Tbs sunflower oil, 1/2 tsp pumpkin spice blend, diced apples, sea salt. Put back the pasta, cover and cook, stir and blend until all water is gone, half mashing the sweet potatoes and squash, peeling off and removing the skins as they come off, until apples are starting to soften. (freshly ground black pepper on plating for those who wanted it). For protein/additional green component, I served this with a bowl of store bought frozen edamame in their pods that were put in a small pot of shallow (1”) water, covered and cooked on high just until boiling hard and steaming.

[pepperhead212]

I made a favorite dish for the superbowl - something that I have been making since the early 80s, and it is the first recipe in the meat chapter in my asian "black book" of favorite recipes.

This is supereasy...as long as you can get chopped up spareribs! I chop them up myself, with a heavy (about 3/8" thick) cleaver. Good way to vent frustrations! lol However, boneless chunks of pork butt can be used, or cut up country style spareribs, which have smaller bones, though they still need to be chopped up. I have a heavy, plastic chopping board, with one side dedicated to this type of chopping, and you can tell!

Chop larger spareribs into 3 pieces, smaller ones into 2 pieces, and boneless pork into maybe 1 1/2" cubes.

1,2,3,4,5 Spareribs

1 tb rice wine or dry sherry
2 tb dark soy sauce
3 tb white vinegar
4 tb sugar
5 tb water
3/4-1 tsp 5 spice powder (optional, but delicious)
1 1/2 lbs cut up spareribs or pork

Combine the non-meat ingredients in a 3 qt sauté pan (about 9"), and stir around, to mix in the 5 spice powder, and dissolve the sugar. Add the meat, and stir to coat. Bring to a boil over med high heat, reduce heat to low, cover, and simmer 40 (for boneless) to 45 (for spareribs) minutes, stirring a few times. Remove cover, raise heat, and boil, until the sauce reduces to a thick glaze, stirring around, to coat the meat. Serve, scraping the glaze out onto the meat, and tilting the pan, to leave the fat on one side.

Recipe can be easily doubled, using a 12" sauté pan.

[digitS']

... ramen noodles, leftover meats, veggies. I hardly ever use the instant flavor packets ...

Yeah, we often toss the packets in the trash ... I can imagine the good flavor of kelp and bonito flakes and have probably had that at a restaurant.

We have a supply of rice noodles and make good use of them. Besides a little meat and the veggies, there is likely garlic salt, hot pepper flakes, Mrs Dash and cilantro.I could probably benefit from exploring the mixed spices a bit further.

Udon is different from spaghetti and such. They are both different from ramen altho all are made from wheat. Am I missing something on the market that is ramen without the, often, unpleasant spice packets? Maybe a little more sophisticated ramen?

Steve

[rainbowgardener]

I also do a lot of stir fries and soups. Somewhere here I postsx a list of different spice palettes to give your stir fry different ethnic feels. ( https://www.helpfulgardener.com/forum/ ... es#p411835 )

One of my favorite easy/comes out nice recipes is (vegetarian) bean stroganoff:

1 large onion chopped
3 cups of chopped mushrooms
1/4 C oil and butter
1/4 C whole wheat flour
3/4 C soup stock/ broth
1/4 C dry wine or sherry
1 tsp salt
2 tsp worcestershire sauce
2 tsp dry mustard
few grindings of fresh nutmeg
1 can dark red kidney beans, rinsed and drained
1-1.5 C light sour cream

Heat 2 T oil and 2 T butter in large heavy frying pan. Saute the onions until they are softening and then add mushrooms and saute until everything is soft and the mushrooms are starting to release their juice.

Stir in the the flour and cook for about 2 minutes until the flour has browned lightly and has coated all the veggies

Stir in the stock, wine, worcestershire, mustard and nutmeg. (Be generous with the nutmeg, it is part of the distinctive stroganoff flavor). Cook until the mixture is quite thick.

Stir in the beans and cook over low heat until they are heated through. Stir in the sour cream and cook on low until it is warmed.

Serve over noodles.

It is quick and easy and yummy. With beans and fat free sour cream, it is high protein and fiber and low fat. For best nutrition, use whole wheat noodles and not too many of them, be generous with the proportion of stroganoff sauce to noodles.

[tomf]

I like making beef soup or chicken noodle soup, some dishes like this or taco filling I make in bulk and freeze in meal sizes for a fast meal.

[rainbowgardener]

During the summer, I make up lots of pesto and freeze it into dinner size bags. Then all I have to do for a nice meal is thaw out a pesto bag and put it over pasta. It is also good in soups, potato salad, etc.

[tomf]

I make a lot of Italian sauce and freeze it. I like pesto maybe I will try that.
Do you guys can what you grow, or freeze more of it?

[rainbowgardener]

More and more these days I freeze things. We got an extra freezer in our garage (our next door neighbors sold their house and moved to Alaska, so they sold us a big freezer very cheap), so plenty of room for frozen stuff. I still can tomatoes and tomato sauce, but that's about it.

[xtron]

I can or dehydrate most of the garden harvest. if the electricity goes out for an extended time, there is less to lose/panic can, eat.
one of our favs is good old black beans and rice

1 pound extra lean ground beef, turkey, bison or chicken
1 onion chopped
1 bell pepper, chopped(optional)
2 cloves minced garlic
1 TBSP
1TBSP mustard, prepared (spicy brown is good)
1tsp chili powder
2TBSP Braggs liquid aminos (or liquid smoke)
dash cayenne pepper
1 can tomato sauce (no sugar added, or home made)
1 can low sodium black beans, rinsed, drained

brown beef with onion, peppers, and garlic in large skillet
in small bowl combine lemon juice, mustard, chili powder, liquid aminos and cayenne with
a small amount of tomato sauce and whisk until thoroughly blended. stir in remaining tomato sauce then add to meat mixture. add beans and cook for 20 minutes, or until flavors are well blended. serve over brown rice.

substitute red beans for black if desired.

[imafan26]

These all sound good. I started on a low carb diet so my meals have been changing. I miss the fruit, but luckily I am not a big fan of sweets. Although, I do miss my bag of chocolates in the frig.

I usually eat bacon and eggs for breakfast, for other meals I just make a salad with some grilled protein. Usually Pork loin chop coated with fresh parsley and pan fried with mushrooms and onions. Or a piece of sirloin marinated in oil, red wine, or Italian dressing and pan fried. Sliced across the grain and served on a salad. For seafood, I like shrimp boiled with a lemon until they turn pink as a salad topper. I have been challenged lately finding salad ingredients since I am trying to avoid lettuce because of the e. coli in romaine. I have had more spinach and asian greens, cabbage, cole slaw, asparagus, brussels sprouts, and broccoli instead. I have been eating more laulau since it is the perfect low carb high fat food with the roast pork or chicken, covered in luau leaves. It has gotten very expensive over the last few years, but it is still one of the better convenience foods for the diet.

[applestar]

So fun to hear about cuisine typical to Hawaii! Do you/can you grow your own leaves? The leaves are not edible, right? So you would not get the “greens” you would with salad? Do you/can you grow more salad greens during the winter months?

I was looking up laulau and wiki description said taro leaves could be used. I had not thought of that — I could easily grow taro even if I don’t always end up with tubers to harvest. Now that I have thought of it, maybe I will try to grow it again this year. The leaves are fun to have growing in the garden, too. I’m trying to grow lotus from seeds, mostly for fun... but lotus leaves could used, too couldn’t they?